Reply

Dear visitor, welcome to SPRINKLER TALK FORUM - You Got Questions, We've Got Answers. If this is your first visit here, please read the Help. It explains how this page works. You must be registered before you can use all the page's features. Please use the registration form, to register here or read more information about the registration process. If you are already registered, please login here.

Attention: The last reply to this post was 3861 days ago. The thread may already be out of date. Please consider creating a new thread.

The last 7 posts

The valves operate using 24 volts of AC current...sent through wires from the controller to the valves....the current opens the solenoid (the thing w/ wires on the top of the valve)....once the solenoid pin pulls up into the coil itself....water comes off the top of the rubber diaphragm in the valve allowing it to open and water.

Do yourself a favor and buy an identical valve. You can dismantle and reassemble it, and get familiar with its parts, besides having it for future repairs. If the repairman misaligned the diaphragm, that would account for the failure to open.

Okay, it finally works, although I now have a humming solenoid.
I dismantled the valve and reinstalled the diaphram assembly after taking apart the shaft, spring, gasket, and diaphram. A repair person had supposedly fixed a leak in this line, and I noticed he had stripped the screw heads and probably never checked to see if the line actually worked after the "repair." The fact that he was careless enough to strip most of the screw heads makes me wonder about the care he took with everything else.
Anyway, I can only assume that the assembly was stuck or that the gasket and cover assembly might have been installed incorrectly, or perhaps it was sticking.
I still don't know how the solenoid actually connects to the valve to open the diaphram--if someone can explain how the valve works, I'd love to know just to satisfy my curiosity--but for now everything appears to be working.
Thanks.

White plastic. Remove the white plastic ring that's pressed into the new solenoid, that holds the plunger inside the solenoid assembly. Older solenoids didn't have this part, and old valves don't always work with newer solenoids until that plastic ring is removed. If your replacement solenoid is 'old stock' and doesn't have the white plastic ring, then you might suspect a bad diaphragm assembly. When they fail, the valve will often refuse to open.

Thanks for the reply. As I said, I'm a novice when it comes to sprinkler repairs.
Are you referring to the plunger that's on the valve or or the solenoid? The plunger on the solenoid does retract as it should. Is there also a moving part, or plunger, on the valve below the solenoid, and is that what you're referring to? If so, does it come out using a small flat-bladed screwdriver, or what?
Thanks.

Help with valve?

One of my sprinkler lines only works when I manually open the valve. It's an irritrol valve, 205 I believe. A repair person told me the solenoid was bad, so I replaced it. The irrigation store also tested the old one and determined it was not working.
I installed the new one, but still the valve would not open when I turned the station 3 on at the controller. The valve would click and buzz, but no water would flow.
The solenoid definitely opens as it should. I switched the solenoid on line 4 to the non-functioning line 3, and still the valve on line 3 would not open. The new soleoid worked on line 4, which suggests that the soleoid is not the problem.
So, what should I do now? The valve has screws holding on the top, but I haven't opened it because I'm not sure what to look for. I'm definitely a novice at this stuff. I really don't want to replace the entire valve, so I'm hoping there is something else I can try.
To review--Line 3 works manually, but not with the soleoid. The solenoid works on another line, but not on line 3. There is a constant buzzing when the solenoid is on, but no water comes through the valve.
Help!